Pops constructing buildings

[Deutscher Kaiser]

The thing I hope most for in project Caesar is a partially autonomous construction of buildings. In EU4, apart from events, all construction of buildings and infrastructure in the entire nation would solely be funded out of the state-budget, pretty much a planned economy (not very historically accurate). The level of subdivision in Caesar seems to be pretty much in the same league as Imperator (though expanded to the whole world), where building expansion was much more fun, but also somewhat tedious. To me it felt somewhat frustrating only having prosperity increase where my attention and state-budget was focused. Caesar could turn this around and adapt historical inspirations.

Historically, governments would intervene in the economy at very specific points - supporting military industries, securing strategic goods, building critical infrastructure. But most of the actual economic devlopment was carried by the population. I'd propose for pops to be in control of most construction - with burghers investing in urban buisnesses and crafts, nobles primarily into the landed economy. Pops could have different levels of wealth associated to them, aswell as different likelihoods of investment - an Amsterdam burgher is more likely to expand buildings than an African landowner. Nobles in general would invest less than burghers of the same wealth. The player would intervene at specific points, just like absolutist rulers set up luxury industries (porcelain, glass), built canals and roads and in general provided economix opportunities. Sound economic policy would consist in shifting this framework favourably, opening new trade, securing new goods, providing privileges and changing laws. This could also individualise a country: historical Poland had strong nobles who set up the Commonwealth as a prime producer and exporter of wheat, Persia possessed several artisanal centres, the Netherlands an unusually large share of burghers expanding trade as well as industry on all levels.

Which of these economic strategies a country pursues should be decided by the player, as well as important micro-decisions - a player might want to proactively establish a beachhead into a new region, such as Russia with Petersburg or Odessa, or expand a key industry such as mining (think of Sweden's actions to increase its ironmining and steelmaking with the help of dutch specialists). This would make player engagement with the economy more meaningful as well as rewarding good strategising with autonomic growth. Ideally, this would also tie in with goods (luxuries detracting wealth from investment and providing trade-oppurtinities, strategic goods like iron or wood necessary for artillery and navy, staples like wheat and cloth increasing the wealth and satisfaction of your pops). Mind you, this needn't be as complex as Victoria, but more of a background-simulation stopping a player from having to manage every part of the economy.

EDIT: See post #13 for implementation ideas.

 

[Teng_Ri]

but its not very historically accurate only for a portion of eu timeline and only for some countries

 

[InsidiousMage]

If the player isn't actually building the buildings then there is no point to actually having buildings in the game so a better idea would be to base the core economic loop around something other than building specific buildings.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

not very historically accurate for a portion of eu timeline and for some countries

How come? I think every change occurring in that timeline could be simulated by changing likelihoods of investments of differents pops as time passes aswell as new opportunities of intervention becoming available to governments. While a feudal prince in the early 1400s might establish a new port-town by handing out town privileges to the local burghers, an absolutist ruler in the 1700s might rapidly construct a fortified naval base and trade centre with state funds (if he has the necessary funds, laws and so on). I think this could add a very interesting dimension to progression through the period.

 

[Teng_Ri]

majority of classical era ottoman projects were state funded as there werent any body, be it real or corporate, wealthy enough

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

If the player isn't actually building the buildings then there is no point to actually having buildings in the game so a better idea would be to base the core economic loop around something other than building specific buildings.

The player would build buildings under specific circumstances (expanding mines, canonfoundries, prestigious religious buildings), but a lot of that would be optional and down to the economic strategy the player pursues. This could also benefit different player types. Someone who loves minmaxing and micromanaging might intervene a lot, a conquest-focused player might refrain from paying much attention to the simulation. The development ist still happening either way and open to player interaction, but the player wouldn't be in control of a 100% of his country's economy.

 

[InsidiousMage]

The player would build buildings under specific circumstances, but a lot of that would be optional and down to the economic strategy the player pursues. This could also benefit different player types. Someone who loves minmaxing and micromanaging might intervene a lot, a conquest-focused player might refrain from paying much attention to the simulation. The development ist still happening and open to player interaction, the player is just not in control of 100% of his countries economy.

Buildings still shouldn't be in the game then. The economy shouldn't be "optional" and should be a core element of the game. Just building the occasional thing and letting the AI handle the rest is bad gameplay and bad game design. Its totally fine to abstract the economy to the point where the player doesn't actually need to build things* but having the player only occasionally build something is the worst of both worlds, especially since building the "correct" buildings is something the AI bad generally across most Paradox games. The player either needs to build everything or there should be no buildings in the games outside of something equivalent to Civ's wonders.

*And I personally would love to see a Paradox game where the player doesn't build a single economic building of any kind and simply sets policies and hand out things like royal monopolies.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

Buildings still shouldn't be in the game then. The economy shouldn't be "optional" and should be a core element of the game. Just building the occasional thing and letting the AI handle the rest is bad gameplay and bad game design. Its totally fine to abstract the economy to the point where the player doesn't actually need to build things* but having the player only occasionally build something is the worst of both worlds, especially since building the "correct" buildings is something the AI bad generally across most Paradox games. The player either needs to build everything or there should be no buildings in the games outside of something equivalent to Civ's wonders.

*And I personally would love to see a Paradox game where the player doesn't build a single economic building of any kind and simply sets policies and hand out things like royal monopolies.

"The economy" would not be optional, but the tools of interacting with the economy would be quite varied. Trade wars, colonisation, conquest of provinces that complement the economy, taxes, monopolies, privileges, laws - and here and there specific investments, all of those would be tools at the players' disposal to influence their economy. Which of those to use when is a player's decision. The automatically built buildings are a way to monitor, influence and fine-tune the economic development of the country. Additionally, this might also show how governments in the era weren't the only powers in their countries (as we will see politically with estates), but throughout the period gained an increasing ability to steer the lands and people they governed.

I agree with you that I would like to see Caesar focus on indirect interactions like policies, monopolies and privileges.

 

[InsidiousMage]

"The economy" would not be optional, but the tools of interacting with the economy would be quite varied. Trade wars, colonisation, conquest of provinces that complement the economy, taxes, monopolies, privileges, laws - and here and there specific investments, all of those would be tools at the players' disposal to influence their economy. Which of those to use when is a player's decision. The automatically built buildings are a way to monitor, influence and fine-tune the economic development of the country. Additionally, this might also show how governments in the era weren't the only powers in their countries (as we will see politically with estates), but throughout the period gained an increasing ability to steer the lands and people they governed.

I agree with you that I would like to see Caesar focus on indirect interactions like policies, monopolies and privileges.

If a game has buildings then buildings are the economy thus what is being built is going to be the the player's primary concern, regardless of whatever else you add to it. You can easily show that the government didn't have perfect control over the economy without having to use buildings.

 

[Foke]

Heeeell nah this isn't victoria my man

 

[WARenie]

If we will have really active estates, then they have to base their power on something: wealth, influence and privileges. It also means that they have to be able to expand their power and invest their wealth. And this investment of wealth must be beneficial not only to them but to the country as well: new market towns, expansion of guilds, construction of new churches, trade posts. Of course they could be represented not as classic paradox buildings, but whatever it is, it should be something which could be influenced both by player and estates. Estates which base their power on something under control of player are essentially under player's control as well, which is not ideal.

Also it reminds me of all these debates on Victoria 3 forum, good times.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

If we will have really active estates, then they have to base their power on something: wealth, influence and privileges. It also means that they have to be able to expand their power and invest their wealth. And this investment of wealth must be beneficial not only to them but to the country as well: new market towns, expansion of guilds, construction of new churches, trade posts. Of course they could be represented not as classic paradox buildings, but whatever it is, it should be something which could be influenced both by player and estates. Estates which base their power on something under control of player are essentially under player's control as well, which is not ideal.

Also it reminds me of all these debates on Victoria 3 forum, good times.

I agree with your sentiments you expressed in that thread, good post! I would particularly reiterate three of your points for project Caesar: Firstly, how irritating a population which shows now basic economic activity is. Secondly, how interesting it would be for the player being one of many agents within their country with different interests, politically and economically; this could also give another dimension to handling estates - if their economic interests are in line with yours, you might want to favour them selectively, nobles for a large agricultural economy, clergy for internal colonisation via monasteries or conversion/education support, burghers for industrial development. Each of these could also get out of hand and confer too much power to the favoured group if not handled with sufficient care. And lastly I would like to emphasise again (as you do): A population that invests in buildings doesn't mean forbidding the player to do so. The player would still invest as one of several investors, shaping the grand structure of his economy through other tools.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

I had some ideas for a technical implementation that might be less performance heavy than having individual pops continuously making weighted investment decisions. As a proxy, the game could check the wealth of each social class (except for peasants and slaves) in a given province (or maybe state) every January 1st. A certain amount of wealth allows for a certain number of ongoing constructions, this could be modified per class - e.g. burghers can construct more per wealth than nobles or clergy. The price of the building would determine how long it takes to construct - pricier buildings "clog up" a class's wealth for longer. Construction time would be another great place to apply modifiers based on laws (smth that boosts nobles and slows burghers?) and edicts, for example. Every class has a different set of buildings it can build (clergy builds monasteries or churches, burghers build industry), sorted by priority. The game would pick buildings in order of priority, mainly determined by the influence/wealth they confer to the class that constructs them. The viable locations in that state could be sorted by "buildings-per-pops" as a proxy for available workforce. Once no more ongoing constructions are supported by the given level of wealth, a new construction will only start if either wealth has increased or another construction has finished. Basically there would be a sorted list in the background whose highest entries are initiated when there is free capacity on January 1st.

Alternatively, each class per state could have a single ongoing construction, here most modifiers would just regulate the speed of the construction. The next construction-project would be decided upon finishing the prior one, by priorities as above.

Either way, simulation of individual investors, earnings, spendings, available workforce and employment would be avoided, but represented via proxy, abstracting everything to modifiers. The buildings would of course feed-back to the population by changing their wealth, promotion-likelihoods and so on, causing dynamic economic development.

Any thoughts?

 

[Brynjar]

If there are to be buildings I want to have full control over what is built where. That also means the amount of being built should be manageable in the vast majority of campaigns. That likely means buildings should be on a province level or higher, depending on the expected amount of blobbing. It also means I shouldn't need to check any pop needs etc. to make sure I'm having enough grain, fish, clothes, churches etc. If I want to do that I will play a Victoria game.

I couldn't care less if the cost of building a large port is taken from my coffers, directly from the people as a whole, or from specific pops. Nor do I care if that cost is paid in manhours, trade goods, money or a combination of those, as long as I can dictate (let's call it an abstraction of encouragement) it being built in a location which makes sense.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

If there are to be buildings I want to have full control over what is built where. That also means the amount of being built should be manageable in the vast majority of campaigns. That likely means buildings should be on a province level or higher, depending on the expected amount of blobbing. It also means I shouldn't need to check any pop needs etc. to make sure I'm having enough grain, fish, clothes, churches etc. If I want to do that I will play a Victoria game.

I couldn't care less if the cost of building a large port is taken from my coffers, directly from the people as a whole, or from specific pops. Nor do I care if that cost is paid in manhours, trade goods, money or a combination of those, as long as I can dictate (let's call it an abstraction of encouragement) it being built in a location which makes sense.

The way I see it, dynamic construction is a lot like dynamic pop growth. You have preferences for where which buildings and pops should be situated, but they have a life of their own. You have various tools to make the right pops and buildings appear in that nice but sparsely populated natural harbour or gold-holding province, some more direct, others indirect. You keep your pops fed, apply growth-bonuses and attract migrants; you might give newcomers tax-freedoms and free land (this could just be one big settlement edict). In the same way you would keep your pops wealthy to ensure economic growth - and because it is autonomic, you don't need to optimise every step of the way. But if you want to optimise, you can either nudge or intervene directly, both can also be combined. If you want that goldprovince to give profits, you can pay for the mine yourself and also build a jewelry manufacture in the next town, maybe also add some infrastructure. If you want that portcity, hand out town privileges to that harbour, but build the port, wharf, and market yourself, add an immigration-edict and strengthen the burghers in that province and the pops will take it from there. Via your actions, you virtually made sure you'd be getting a bustling hub for maritime trading and military up in next to no time.

 

[Universalis_]

As much as I'd love to see this, I think a game rule would be necessary regarding how much the player and the "estates" can do in such a scenario.
Generally, players end up trying to min-max or do campaigns where their countries are "super competent" so to speak, that's not a bad thing, far from it, the player is here to have fun and will do whatever they wish to achieve their goals.

In Vic2 and even Vic3, you had capitalists (and other investors) building things that made no sense or that went directly against what the player wished to do.
It's possible to blame it on AI or something and claim that a "good AI" would manage it just fine, following this logic of improving the economic conditions of the country and all that, or as a more appropriate thing, that the estates that investing in their buildings are doing what is necessary to accumulate more wealth, power and relevance, which doesn't necessarily correlate with "better conditions for the populace", merely for the elites.

In that case, I'd say that maybe you enter the topic of "What is good AI?", and the thing is that a dumb, stupid AI is bad AI, much like how a super competent AI is also bad AI since the game, divided between the Player and the Computer/Other, makes it that the Player depends on the short-comings of the AI to assert its will, in other words, player agency is directly linked with the performance of an AI, and for it, you need to find a balance where the game is fun, the AI can handle itself (and so can the estates), whereas the AI isn't a super competent machine who will crush new players and minor nations (even if led by a good player).

I like this idea, but then again we're speculating and presuming lots of things, we don't know how the economy is going to work, goods, buildings, trade, and all that, it's something that we'll be able to provide better feedback (and guesses) once more DDs are released.
Basically, what I'm saying here is that depending on the implementation, you end up taking player agency, and it's important to note that in EU games, you aren't exactly the "ruler" or the "State", so the player still should be able to build anything whenever he wants, much like estates should be able to do so.
Also, it should be implemented in a different manner than Vicky.

 

[Ultranoob]

Autonomous buildings, autonomous armies, autonomous colonization ... I guess some people just don't want to play at all. I reccomend watching a documentary.

 

[WARenie]

Autonomous buildings, autonomous armies, autonomous colonization ... I guess some people just don't want to play at all. I reccomend watching a documentary.

Please, recommend me a historical documentary which you can watch from a standpoint of any actor, influence the complex sandbox world with many other independent actors working toward their own goals (which might interfere with your own) and experience the changes caused by you and other actors like in Paradox games.

 

[Deutscher Kaiser]

If we will have really active estates, then they have to base their power on something: wealth, influence and privileges. It also means that they have to be able to expand their power and invest their wealth. And this investment of wealth must be beneficial not only to them but to the country as well: new market towns, expansion of guilds, construction of new churches, trade posts. Of course they could be represented not as classic paradox buildings, but whatever it is, it should be something which could be influenced both by player and estates. Estates which base their power on something under control of player are essentially under player's control as well, which is not ideal.

Also it reminds me of all these debates on Victoria 3 forum, good times.

Bring out the champagne!

 

[Brynjar]

In the same way you would keep your pops wealthy to ensure economic growth - and because it is autonomic, you don't need to optimise every step of the way.

You call it autonomic, but then continue posting a long list of suggestions for micromanagement we would have to deal with to be able to influence what is built where. I'll rather just build the buildings manually.